For Sting Eucliffe, Lucy Heartfillia is a weak, too girly-girl member of the Sabertooth's rivalry guild, Fairy Tail. Sting first was not aware of her, he knew she was there but he barely acknowledge her presence.

For Sting Eucliffe, Lucy Heartfillia is a weak, too girly-girl member of the Sabertooth's rivalry guild, Fairy Tail. Sting first was not aware of her, he knew she was there but he barely acknowledge her presence. Like the desk in his room or the fence around his yard, she completed the atmosphere yet he never cared to concern himself with.

He started noticing her after her fight with Flare Corona of Raven Tail. She almost won the fight if only Obra didn't dispel her magical power. He can feel the overwhelming power while she was chanting the spell. She even summoned one Golden Celestial Spirit after another.

'Not bad little girl.' he inwardly praise as he recognized her true potential. Just barely though.

At the very end of the Grand Magic Games, enemies revealed themselves, who were trying to kidnap Lucy in order to accomplished Zeref's Eclipse Plan. They were planing to sacrifice one Celestial Spirit Mage and they have turned their target from Lucy to Yukino of Sabertooth but the blonde Mage surprisingly volunteered to be the sacrifice instead much to her guild mates and Sabertooth's Mages' confusion and anger.

"What the fuck are you saying, Lucy!" Natsu angrily exclaimed.

Lucy's brown eyes were covered by her golden tresses. "Yukino-san is a fellow Celestial Mage and I cannot bear to watch those bastards sacrificing another Celestial Mage before my very eyes!" Lucy determinedly answered, her used to be soft and always smiling brown eyes were now sharp; giving death glare at their enemies.

As if a cue, all of the Fairy Tail guild members present inside the large stadium appeared in front of Lucy determined to protect their precious blonde nakama.

After the whole incident, Fairy Tail who not just awarded as the champion of the Grand Magic Games, they were also regarded as the Fiore Kingdom's savior for defeating the enemies and saving the life of everyone (enemies or not) inside the stadium.

Yukino left Sabertooth guild and became Fairy Tail's newest and second Celestial Mage. The second Spirit Mage was keen to follow and serve Lucy because the latter was willing to sacrifice her own life for her, much to our favorite brown eyed Celestial Mage's embarrassment.

The Grand Magic Games ended and that was the last time Sting saw this blonde girl who undeniably stir his attention.

Two years later, done with their mission in Acalypha Forest, Sting has irrefutably lost sight of Rogue and the two Exceed cats. The White Dragon Slayer sighed in exasperation and stopped to think of a way how to find his nakama.

'Nakama?' Sting chuckled.

If he was still the same Sting Eucliffe as before he wouldn't ever considered calling his comrade as his comrade because he doesn't believe in such pathetic word but ever since a certain blonde Celestial Mage displayed her willingness to sacrifice her own life in order to protect someone who she barely even know changed his view about comradeship.

Sting felt himself smiling but when he heard ruffling sounds of shrubbery near he was automatically on his fighting stance waiting for the appearance of enemy.

"Who is it?" Sting shouted, alert and highly guarded.

The White Dragon Slayer blinked his eyes in confusion when Lucy Heartfillia, whom he was thinking just a while ago, was now standing in front of him. She mirrored the same confusion on his handsome face.

"Sting-san?" she asked, titling her head to her side and blinked couple of times.

Ignoring the burning sensation on his cheeks when his name escaped Lucy's lips, Sting frowned at her. "What are you doing here?" he instead asked.

"You as well, what are you doing here? Have you, by any chance, saw Natsu and the others around here?"

Sting shook his head. "No. What, are you lost or something?"

Lucy blushed and vigorously shook her head. "W-what n-n-nonsense are y-you t-talking about?" she said flustered, obvious denying that she was indeed lost.

Sting stared at the fidgeting blonde Mage and silently studied the changes on her two years after the Grand Magic Games. Sure, Sting knew that she was beautiful, there's no point arguing with that. But after those two years she looked totally different, her straight blonde hair was almost reaching her slender waist though she still have her usual hairstyle.

Her collection of keys grew more as well, not only she has the ten of the twelve Golden Keys (the last two were under Yukino's contract) her Silver Keys collection also grew. Lucy has three of the rarest Rainbow Keys (keys of Andromeda, Draco and Perseus) that were recently and which holds the strongest Spirits of all. Lucy, for the record, was the first ever Celestial Mage towowed such powerful spirits.

This alone symbolized how strong a Celestial Mage Lucy was, sadly according to Yukino, Lucy thinks the other way around. Lucy lacked confidence over her true potential as Mage, even though her Spirits (particularly the Lion Spirit, Leo) and her comrades showered her with praises that she is indeed strong, she still has no confidence about her magical prowess.

"Sting-san? Are you okay?" Lucy asked as she waved her hand in front of him after noticing that he was spacing out.

Lucy twitched and spun around seeing the dark guild members she and the others were assigned to capture. She had lost track of the all-too-excited Natsu and Happy when Erza decided to split the group in three.

Erza and Gray took the north part of the forest while Wendy, Charle and Yukino took the south. She, Natsu and Happy took the east part but unfortunately she got separated with Natsu and his flying Exceed cat, Happy.

"Are you the ones who were trying to disband our guild?" one of the members of the illegal guild spat, glaring maliciously at Lucy making the latter shivered in both disgust and fear.

There were total of ten men surrounding Lucy and Sting. Lucy immediately pulled one of her Rainbow Keys and chanted, "I am linked to the path to the world of Celestial Spirits, now! O spirit, answer my call and pass through the gate!" there were rainbow colors bursting from the Rainbow Keys as Lucy chanted her summoning quotes. "Open the gate of Perseus. Perseus!"

A man with scarlet shoulder length hair and handsome feature wearing white ancient Greek clothing and a metal band around his head appeared before Lucy after the white smoke disappeared.

"You called, Lucy?" he asked politely, bowing his head at her.

"Perseus, onegai!" Lucy said quickly grabbing the whip on her belt, preparing herself to battle alongside with her spirit.

Perseus bowed again. "As you wish..." and then the Celestial Spirit leaped forward towards the enemies and singlehandedly defeated the members of the illegal guild with some help of Lucy using her whip.

"Oryaaah!" one of the men aimed his dagger at Lucy, who had her attention unto one of his comrades.

"Kyaaaaa~~!" Lucy gasped her eyes widened in surprise; she was unable to duck away from the sharp weapon when a blur of gold passed right in front of her.

Lucy blinked her eyes and stared at the back of Sting who just blocked the attack that was originally meant for her. It took for her genius mind seconds to comprehend the situation. She felt her face heating up while she was being protected by Sting, of all people.

Perseus appeared next to Lucy, worried about his Master. "Lucy, are you okay?" he asked.

Lucy absently nodded as her answer; her wide brown eyes glued at the back of Sting who was busy beating the remaining members of the Dark Guild. Lucy smiled sincerely and thanked Perseus before her spirit returned to the Celestial Realm.

"T-Thank you for, you know, protecting me." Lucy mumbled shyly.

Sting looked ever his shoulder with his stoic face and shrugged his shoulders.

"Its nothing." he said before silence took over between them. "Yukino was right."

Lucy blinked. "Right about what?" she asked curiously.

"That you're strong, somehow."

Lucy's cheeks burned in bright red, she quickly dragged her eyes away from Sting. "O-of course I'm not, it's my spirits who were strong." she denied and she started mumbling under her tone, "A-and it's not like I'm strong like Erza or the others and—"

"You're strong." Sting insisted. "It's not who you are that holds you back, it's who you think you're not. You don't have to compare yourself with the others because you're strong, maybe not as strong as Natsu-san, but nevertheless you're strong." he added before started pacing away from Lucy.

The blonde girl stared in awe at Sting's retreating back until he disappeared in between the trees, the burning of her cheeks intensified ten folds as his words echoed inside her head.

'It's not who you are that holds you back, it's who you think you're not.'

"Lucy!" a very worried cry interrupted Lucy.

She twitched and watched as Natsu and Happy came rushing towards her, there were scratches all over Natsu, probably courtesy of their red haired Mage when he had lost sight of both the enemies and Lucy; followed closely by the very worried Erza, Gray, Wendy and Yukino.

"Lucy-sama!" Yukino immediately approached and turned Lucy around inspecting if the blonde Mage was injured or not. "You're not hurt right Lucy-sama? Those idiots did not hurt you badly right?"

"Yukino, I'm okay. You don't have to be so worried like that and I told you to stop calling with that honorifics." Lucy said with sweat drop adorned her forehead.

Yukino sighed in relief and then look around at the unconscious members of the dark guild they were supposed to be disbanding.

"Wow, Lucy, you did all of this?" Gray asked in amazement.

"Lucy rocks!" Natsu exclaimed proud of his team mate slash best friend. "I told you many times that you're strong!"

They were expecting for their blonde team mate to deny that like she used to do but to their confusion, Lucy merely smiled and nodded. "Thank you." she said instead of arguing that she's not strong and then she turned around to tie the unconscious men before they decided to run away.

Lucy and Sting's first accidental meeting was followed by another one. Sting build up his courage to asked her to have dinner with him. Lucy agreed to Sting's relief (he thought she's going to decline). Her personality is much more mature and wiser than what she really looks like.

He enjoyed spending time with her and learning about her life, he laughed at her sense of humor and she laughed at his. It was refreshing feeling for the White Dragon Slayer considering it was his first time to like a girl.

The other members of Sabertooth knew that Sting was dating someone because the latter was pretty easy to read but still they were shock to discover that Sting was actually dating Lucy Heartfillia of Fairy Tail.

Their dates were followed by another and then another until Lucy's guild mates finally learned who she was dating and for Sting it was the worst weeks for him.

Natsu ever so protective over Lucy, threatened to burn Sting alive if ever he made a move to hurt his blonde best friend. Whenever Sting visited Fairy Tail guild to take Lucy out for a date, he can feel Natsu's death glare behind his head and if the saying 'if looks can kill' he'll probably be dead by now.

Gray was discreet about his resentment towards Sting though he was as equally frustrated as the Fire Dragon Slayer because this Sabertooth moron decided to date their precious blonde Celestial Mage. He was always giving Sting a warning glare whenever he had chance.

And Erza? Well Sting has to go hiding for two week because the red hair Mage threatened to do some painful thing on him if ever she caught him. She was yelling that he tainted Lucy's innocence. What kind of stupid reason was that? If it wasn't for Lucy calming the strong S-Class Mage he wouldn't be able to go out of the safety bunker, at their guild's basement, he was hiding in.

Yukino, despite being his former comrade, warned Sting if ever he did anything to make her unhappy. She also helped Happy and Natsu in some of their childish revenge plots that consist of putting too much tobasco on his food or putting a burning charcoal on his chair.

Lucy was giggling at her boyfriend's misfortune while nursing the bruises on his handsome face. "It's just their way of showing they care about me, Sting." she said in amusement.

"Could you at least tell them to lessen their murderous attempt? I maybe one of the strongest Dragon Slayers here but I don't think I can keep up with their killing intents." Sting complained.

Lucy giggle and bended forward to plant a kiss on her boyfriend's lips. Although she had reprimanded her nakama to at least lessen their way of torturing her boyfriend, their gestures made Lucy feels so special and loved that sometimes she ended up laughing instead of sympathizing Sting though she promised to him that her nakama will not be the cause of any hindrance between him and her.